A new, disputed report from one Wall Street analyst claims Apple's Mac sales have slowed significantly since the fourth week in July, suggesting its back-to-school promotion is not boosting sales as much as expected.

The rumors from analyst Trip Chowdhry of Global Equities Research were revealed in a note to investors issued on Wednesday. They arrived one day after a separate research note from analyst Maynard Um with UBS Investment Research said Mac sales are strong, directly contradicting Chowdhry's conclusions.

Chowdhry said that the past weekend "was probably one of the slowest weekends for Mac sales" in the current calendar year, citing proprietary research based on "various tracking data." Last weekend, he said Mac sales were "probably down" between 35 percent and 40 percent from the weekend of July 23.

The data culled by Chowdhry stands in opposition to Um, who said his own checks within the retail channel found that demand for back-to-school PCs has been "encouraging." He said on Tuesday Apple's Mac brand "continues to be the most popular among consumers and students heading back to school."

Chowdhry, however, believes that Mac sales have been impacted by high gas prices, which he says have "made consumers more price sensitive." The analyst surveyed four university book stores, who reportedly revealed a "significant" drop in Mac sales over the last three weeks, though employees were said to be "optimistic" that sales will increase when schools reopen.

Global Equities Research also spoke with an undisclosed number of parents who reportedly indicated that this year's back-to-school promotion, offering a $100 App Store gift card, is not adequate. He said most parents would rather receive $100 cash back on education pricing.

The analyst believes Apple should extend its back-to-school promotion by 10 days to Sept. 30, 2011, and increase the amount of the App Store gift card to $125. He also suggested that Apple offer its hardware protection plan through its application stores, allowing parents to use their App Store gift card to purchase an extended warranty.

If true, Chowdhry's findings would be particularly surprising, as Mac sales have consistently outperformed the rest of the PC market for years. Though he characterized Mac sales as "weak," no comparisons were made to sales in the larger PC industry over the last few weeks.

While Chowdhry's claims go against convention, it should also be noted that Apple did report lower-than-expected Mac sales in its previous quarter. Analysts on Wall Street believed the company would sell a record 4.2 million Macs, but actual sales came in at 3.95 million.

Last month, the same analyst said he expects Apple to launch three HDTV models by March 2012. He expects Apple to enter the high-definition television set market based on details culled from a number of developer events he attended.

Last year, Chowdhry incorrectly claimed that Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer would give a presentation at Apple's annual Worldwide Developers Conference. The analyst said that Microsoft would take the stage to showcase Visual Studio 2010, but that event never happened.

"Apple's Mac sales have slowed significantly since yesterday at 4 p.m. GMT, suggesting its back-to-school promotion is not boosting sales as much as expected."

Chowdhry said that the past 3 hours "were probably one of the slowest 3 hours for Mac sales" in the current calendar day.

This from a guy who estimated last Q revenue tobe $24.8 billion (actual $28.57) and eps to be $5.81 (actual $7.79). I bet this gets picked up by cnbc, Reuters, ap, WSJ, bloomberg and barons just to bash apple.

believes that Mac sales have been impacted by high gas prices, which he says have "made consumers more price sensitive." The analyst surveyed four university book stores, who reportedly revealed a "significant" drop in Mac sales over the last three weeks, though employees were said to be "optimistic" that sales will increase when schools reopen.

Wait, what? He went to a couple of uni bookstores before classes and it looked slow, therefore gas prices are hurting computer sales....?

Might as well see what sign the MacBook is and do an astrology chart to predict sales. What a load of crap.

OSX, because making UNIX user friendly is easier than debugging windows.

I do realize that this is hardly count as a "statistic", but over last week I had experience with Apple retail store two times. We bought Mac Book Air for my wife and my doughtier get herself new iPad. On both occasions, place was PACKED to the brim. Me and my doughtier had to wait to get attention from one of Apple Store employe. There were a lot of them, but they ALL were busy selling anything and everything Apple.

It sounds like this guy have some shorts on AAPL coming (probably he thought that the whole market will go down after S&P downgrade). Sad part, that he will get away with this.

indicated that this year's back-to-school promotion, offering a $100 App Store gift card, is not adequate. He said most parents would rather receive $100 cash back on education pricing.

"This same analyst, however, did not bother researching the educational promotion, which saves you a minimum of $100 on a MacBook Pro, and $66 on AppleCare in addition to the meager $100 gift card."

Although it does that all-year round. Ostensibly, the back-to school promotions are intended to strengthen sales in what would otherwise be a less profitable quarter. If the promotion is not as valuable to the consumer compared to previous years, it could very well lead to a relatively worse quarter than last year.

The first problem I have with this is that most Mac Back To Scools sales happen well before August. Depending upon the school some students are probably already back to school or in a mad rush to get ready. The whole point with the early summer start of these sales programs is to capture customers before their minds turn to otherthings.

However to play devils advocate here there are some issues with this years program. One is the assumption that people are happy with the non discount. I do believe over all educational sales will be impacted by this years program.

The second issue is that the dropping of the Mac Book and pushing of the AIRs is extremely stupid. The problem is that Apple no longer has a full performance low end notebook. I actually believe Apple was trying to shore up sales of the AIRs by dropping the Mac Book. The unfortunate thing here is that you can't force the sale of hardware people don't want. In the end many customers will walk away from Apple and the AIRs simply because they have to think about the machines suitability for their needs.

Here is the ugly truth: for most college students their laptop is much more than a word processor. It effectively is also an entertainment system, a communications system and even a replacement for a stereo. People will look at the AIR and see that it comes up short in a number of ways.

I don't know if this guy is blowing smoke or not, what I do know is that Apple needs to overhaul it's Mac management team. Frankly they have lost it. It isn't like removing the CD drive from the Mini was bad as I think it was a good move. The problem with both the Mini and the AIR is that they did not offer up a viable way to get legacy support that many need. With the advent of TB they really should have debuted a Time Capsule like device with a CD drive.

This moron will keep his job if sites like this keep publishing his crap. Stop giving time to these analysts, most of them barely understand what they are talking about....

Shaw Wu is another analyst who seems to get things wrong quite a bit, and although he is generally bullish on Apple, you'd think he would have to answer for his errors. I have noticed that he has moved several times to different companies over the last three or four years. Whether he left of his own volition or was invited to seek employment elsewhere is not known. The point is that if we can keep a bit of corporate memory on these things we might find that they are in fact losing/changing their employment at any given company over time. This might give us an indirect read on their "value" to their respective companies. FWIW...

None of them (I mean none) have pedicured Apple quarterly sales of MACs, iPhones, or iPads within any reasonable margin of error for years. They also tend to predict universally low. They all have a reliable track record of inaccuracy. Why do any of them still have jobs? Why do they continue to use the same flawed methods?

These people posting data collected by calling a few local stock clerks should be imprisoned (or heavily fined) for passing this off as research and analysis.

hmm.. I did my part. Bought my first mac. Not really sure what took me so long... I love it!

Congrats! I transitioned back in 07, largely because of iPhone and Windows Vista. Now am on my second Mac and once I get a job (I'm a recent grad) am planning to buy a mini as well.

And I am surprised by this, because I am still around campus a lot while I am searching for work, and more people than not have a mac or an iPad. Perhaps people are opting for iPad over a macbook air nowadays though.

I bought a new Macbook Pro last week at Best Buy and love it, also this is the first time I was into a store where the sales people were pushing Mac's usually PC's, I watched for a while and heard them tell customers that Mac"s don't get viruses like PC. Was nice to see them push Mac"s.
Michael

Is it too hard to believe that the iPad maybe cannibalizing some Mac sales? I know of at least two instances where people have stuck with their Windows desktops and bought an iPad instead of a MacBook.

Is it too hard to believe that the iPad maybe cannibalizing some Mac sales? I know of at least two instances where people have stuck with their Windows desktops and bought an iPad instead of a MacBook.

Suggesting that people may buy an iPad over a new 'PC' is different from suggesting that Mac sales are suffering. Don't think Apple isn't aware the iPad will cannibalize some Mac sales in the short term but the growth rate for Macs is quite high compared to the 'PC' market as a whole that I suspect we're see Apple breaking YoY records yet again.

Dick Applebaum on whether the iPad is a personal computer: "BTW, I am posting this from my iPad pc while sitting on the throne... personal enough for you?"